newbie piping questions - what size return - what size overflow?

[Milad]

So im going to be buying a 180g in the next week and a half.
I decided to model so I can get a feel of what its going to look like in my place.
Here is what I have so far:

Green is return, red is overflow
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aq-side-1.jpg


refugium pluming
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aq-ref.jpg

a shot of the back
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aq-rear-1.jpg

The final product
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aq-complete-1.jpg


As you can see, I want to get a little baby refugium on display just for shits and giggles.
So my questions are:
What size piping should get returned from pump?
What size piping should T off to the refugium and back into sump?
Is the return and overflow too close together on the refugium?
Is the return and overflow too close together on the main tank?
What size piping should be on the main tank overflows?

Any help is greatly appericated, im new to these boards!

[MikeInToronto]

Gave up on that "how much flow through my sump" thread eh? ;)

I can only give you my opinions on your overflow. You'll need to choose your pipe sizes based on the size of your return pump. If your overflow can handle 600 gph you'll need the appropriately sized overflow pipe (as a minimum). Here's a calculator:
http://www.aquariumpros.ca/modules/Overflow_Drain_Calculator/index.php

If you tell us the pump you plan to use, someone can probably give you exact pipe sizes for both.

As an aside: You should consider the Beananimal (http://www.beananimal.com/projects/silent-and-fail-safe-aquarium-overflow-system.aspx)(or even Herbie) overflow. You won't regret it.

[Milad]

well I dont know which pump to get yet. I wanted a good quality pump with very little noise.
i was looking at either:
http://www.jlaquatics.com/product/tz-wp107304/Tunze+Silence+Water+Pump+-+1073.040.html

or

http://www.marineandreef.com/4_MDQX_SC_Aquarium_Pump_Little_Giant_p/rlg82507.htm

suggestion on the pump?

thats why my other thread was started so I could figure out which pump to get!

[Milad]

wow that beananimal link is nice
But it means I gota drill another hole in the tank!

[mark]

check out a Herbie (http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=344892), just needs 2 holes and you'll find quieter than a Durso, Stockman or Hofer.

As for as pipe size, I've got a 1" return and 2x2" drains, can easily handle 2000gph so hindsight could have gone smaller. If you do go a Herbie or Bean, look at Bean's calculator (http://www.beananimal.com/articles/hydraulics-for-the-aquarist.aspx), seems you get a lot of water through a relatively small pipe on a full siphon.

[Skimmerking]

IME
The days of having huge water volumes through a sump are pretty much over. Lots of people are converting over to having less flow in the sump for 3 important reasons.
1 to clean from the skimmer
2 to heat from the heaters
3 less chance of having micro bubbles
lots of people are going with the bigger water movers in the main display IE
Tunze's
Vortech's
closed loop
but for a rule of thumb the measurements are like this as the following
3/4"- 750 gph
1"-1000 gph
1.5"- 1500 gph
2"- 2000 gph
that is a approx measurement. But personally I would stay in the 1.5"-2" for the drainage just so that if anything goes down you don't get a clog from it.

[Milad]

i really liked bean's design and i like the idea of going with water movers in the tank
The tank already has two holes drilled so can i use those two holes to push water into the tank? and drill three more holes up higher to implment bean's design? all with smaller piping?

here is a drawing of what i mean:
The green pipes are the return and the red are the drain
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/newholes1-1-1.jpg

http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/newholes2-1.jpg

[Milad]

btw which pump would you guys suggest?

[golf nut]

You might want to reconfigure the returns to the the tank, they are somewhat low, if the power fails you will have a flood on your hands, ideally they should return to the opposite end where they would move the surface water to the overflow box but that would alter the aesthetics of the tank. You could reduce the width of the overflow box and bring the returns up higher on the end sides to reduce the flooding issue.

[Milad]

can I not use some sort of check vavle?
http://www.plastomatic.com/ckm.html

those holes are already drilled so thats why i figured ill use them.

You might want to reconfigure the returns to the the tank, they are somewhat low, if the power fails you will have a flood on your hands, ideally they should return to the opposite end where they would move the surface water to the overflow box but that would alter the aesthetics of the tank. You could reduce the width of the overflow box and bring the returns up higher on the end sides to reduce the flooding issue.

[golf nut]

I removed the word check valve from my dictionary, Murphy advised it.

Do you have pictures of exactly what holes you have and where?

[Bloodasp]

You could put a 90 degree elbow on your return going up. not sure what it will do to the look of your tank but worth trying in your rendering. The check valve could work too and just do regular maintenance to make sure it is not failing.

[Milad]

MR OM i hear what you mean, one more thing that could go wrong
The current holes are about 8 inches from top and about 4 inches from the side
The second rendering has the green pipes going through the current holes

Bloodasp, wouldnt that just make it drain the same water that was returned back up?

[golf nut]

Do you plan on having the display as a peninsula, or is it just the way it is drawn. what diameter holes are drilled at the locations you gave.

[Milad]

yes its a peninsula
its going to be used as a "wall" between living room and office
i believe the hole are 1.5in i think.

[golf nut]

Stick with the first plan aq-rear-1.jpg unless you are prepared to drill more holes, if the holes are drilled for 1 1/2 bulkheads and you use a nominal return pump then the Herbie drain will be more than adequate, if they are only 1 1/2 holes in the glass then I would get it drilled properly in which case you have a clean slate to do as you wish.

[Milad]

is 1.5 a weird diameter? im not 100% sure what they are im going by what i remember when i saw the tank. I wont have it until 1.5 weeks from now. They could have been 2"

I just want to make sure there is a backup for the backup. I would die if 180g of water went everywhere!

bloodasp suggestion doesnt look to bad i just dont know if its going to pull in the same water it returned or not.

i could just plug the existing holes and drill 3 new holes...

this is hard setting it up as a peninsula, very little to work with.

[golf nut]

Peninsulas have their share of problems but principles stay the same, get the hole sizes then we know what you have to play with.

[kien]

oh hey this is where you guys all went! :lol:

All you need are two drains to run a herbie as already mentioned. One for the main and one for the emergency. It looks like you have a third in your overflow box? I'd either cap that off and don't use it, or 'T' two of them together as your main and use the third as an emergency. Another option is to use the third as a second emergency which I think you were planning but that is a little overkill. Nothing wrong with that though I guess. If your drains are 1.5" it will be very hard to overflow a wide open 1.5" drain unless your return pump is rated for something insane like 3000gph (don't forget about the loss of flow due to elbow, head and such), which it probably won't because then you're pushing way too much water through your sump in my opinion :biggrin:

Another thing, those holes that you are planning to use as returns, I personally would not use them. They are a bit low and will probably cause overflow in your sump (unless your sump is massive, like 200g and only run at half level) if the power goes out. You can throw a check valve on those but you will need to remove those check valves and clean them frequently otherwise they will gum up with junk and eventually fail. Or worse, what happens if a snail gets in there? If it can happen imagine that it will :-) It may not happen today or tomorrow or next month, but that's the problem with Murphy right? You just don't know when.. Instead, I would run your return up and over the edge of the tank and while you're at it I would run the return pipe to the other end of the tank (opposite from the return overflow).

There's really no right on wrong answer really, whatever you end up doing, if you get water into the sump and out of the sump then it is working. It all boils down to how efficient you want to make it, how much maintenance you want down the road, how much of a failure alleviation factor you want to put in, etc.. Based on my experience with peninsulas that's what I would do :-) There are a crap load of them on canreef, just do a search and you'll find them :-)

[mark]

The current holes are about 8 inches from top and about 4 inches from the side


As MrOM cautions re low return holes

To find the size of sump you'll need to handle the just back flow if you lost power and the check valves not working, it's the 8" x the width x the length of tank divided by 231 for gallons. You'll probably find it 50+ gallons.

Not ideal but could still use the holes for return, just have your return line go up to the top of the tank then back down to the holes and have a small siphon break at the top. Line can extend fr the siphon break to over the tank.

[MikeInToronto]

All you need are two drains to run a herbie as already mentioned. One for the main and one for the emergency. It looks like you have a third in your overflow box? I'd either cap that off and don't use it, or 'T' two of them together as your main and use the third as an emergency. Another option is to use the third as a second emergency which I think you were planning but that is a little overkill. Nothing wrong with that though I guess. If your drains are 1.5" it will be very hard to overflow a wide open 1.5" drain unless your return pump is rated for something insane like 3000gph (don't forget about the loss of flow due to elbow, head and such), which it probably won't because then you're pushing way too much water through your sump in my opinion :biggrin:

He has 3 because he's planning a Beananimal, and he has more than enough room to do it. I wouldn't sacrifice the extra security if I didn't have to, even if I thought it was redundant.

[golf nut]

It looks like you have a third in your overflow box?


He doesn't have an overflow box yet, just the 2 holes

[Milad]

to answer some questions
I dont have overflow yet
And only two holes drilled around 8in from top 4 inches from side (i dont have aquarium yet so im not sure exact mesurements)

You guys are giving me some great info btw, very appericated
Taking into considertion everything everyone is saying, I made two new models. One has a herbie one has a bean. Both returns feed to other side of tank (now i gota build a damn canopy!)

1in drains, 3/4 return to 1/2 at the end of return (the T for two nozzles).
At the ends of the return, ill drill two holes on each end so it doesn create a siphon when water gets below them.

My biggest concern about the herbie is it looks like I have to try to match the flow of the return pump with the full siphon otherwise its going to make some noise. Plus there is only one emergency which kinda freaks me out.

For the bean, because my holes are so low, I had to "modify" the design by going up then coming back down. Not sure if thats safe or not.

I didnt model the refugium in because it looks like I have to do a herbie/bean to the small 5.5g otherwise all the fail safes im doing on the big tank wont matter if the 5.5g drain clogs. Thoughts? I really wanted a refugium display!

Here is the herbie
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aquarium3-HERBIE.jpg

Here is the bean
http://i389.photobucket.com/albums/oo340/cryptic80/aquarium3-bean.jpg

[kien]

You can 'T' off your return and send some return water to your refugium and drain the refugium back into the sump.

Matching a return pump to your overflow isn't hard. You can either trial and error it, or just take a poll and ask others what they are using for return pumps with their herbie overflows.

Think of it this way, your wide open overflow is going to flow out whatever your pump is going to put out. So long as your return pump is rated for less than what your emergency pipe is rated for you're okay. If your 1.5" pipe can do 1500 gph, just make sure your return pump (don't forget to account for head loss, bends, etc), isn't pumping out more than that and your emergency will be fine.

I have a mag18 which is rated for 1800gph (probably getting about 1100gph after head loss, bends, etc), and when my 1.5" drain pipe is wide open there is more than enough flow on the emergency (super noisy though). If you're really worried then just use the third drain pipe as a secondary emergency.

You can also put a ball valve on your return line so that you can adjust the flow of the return pump. So if you end up buying a pump that flows more than your overflow can handle, just throttle it back with the ball valve. I wouldn't completely cut the water with that ball valve though, instead, give it an outlet that feeds back into the sump.

[Milad]

Kien thanks for the info on the herbie. I was looking through your threads on your build all morning, very nice!

Why herbie over beananimal? If im going to drill another hole to handle the second emergency then why dont I just go with the beananimal version. Also is your herbie loud at all?

would you recommend your pump for my setup?

[kien]

Kien thanks for the info on the herbie. I was looking through your threads on your build all morning

I'm sorry to hear that.. and I'm afraid there are no refunds for your time lost. :lol:

I'm afraid I don't have any experience with beananimals so I can't comment on them.

My herbie is silent, as they should be once you dial them in properly. The only noise coming from the system should be the overflow of water into the overflow box. The higher that water has to drop the noisier it will be so if you do go herbie try to keep that to a minimum. Granted even that isn't a huge amount of noise and applies to any overflow system, not just herbies.

I have not had any issues with my mag18. Your tank is virtually the same dimensions as mine, except yours is a little taller so yes, I would highly recommend that pump. It is quiet and so far bullet proof. Prior to that pump I had a QuietOne 6000 which was actually noisier than the mag18. I also had problems with previous pumps where they would not turn back on after a power fail. So far the mag18 has not failed to restart and I cut power to the return pump at least once a week when I do water changes.

Hope that helps!

[golf nut]

Until we know exactly what size holes are drilled already it is difficult to determine what is the most effective way to continue, if indeed they are 2" then a Herbie will be fine, it isn't possible to have the secondary drain of 1 1/2 flood with the pump size you are considering I doubt any saltwater pump with a 3/4 outlet could get a 1 1/2 drain to kick into siphon mode..

Having the sump returns at the other end is perfect and should still leave you a little window for the refugium, just make sure the refugium drain is large enough to handle all the flow from the return pump should something happen to the sump returns.

ps the sump returns should have elbows on them to move the surface water down the length of the tank, as long as they are just below the surface siphon breaks are not required..

[Milad]

so i just got the tank!! woot
the bulk heads are 1.5 inches
they are 12 inches from top of tank to bottom of bulk head

Should i stick with the herbie?

im considering a sedra 9000 pump.

[monocus]

you might have a dead area furthest from your returns-i stuck a 4 way wave maker on my return pump and had my returns at all 4 corners of my 220 coming up the outside of my tank and hidden by 4 pillars